


a quiet sort of anger

by Quillium



Series: I Have a Spatula [10]
Category: Batman - All Media Types
Genre: Batfam Focus, Gen
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-08-10
Updated: 2019-08-10
Packaged: 2020-08-14 04:33:54
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,090
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20186323
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Quillium/pseuds/Quillium
Summary: “You’re teaching him bad habits,” Tim nudges Dick as they watch Damian sketch out Titus in rough, brusque lines.





	a quiet sort of anger

**Author's Note:**

> Remember to floss your teeth and stretch in 20-minute intervals. Basics like sleep and water are super important as well. Take care of yourselves. (Also I've been watching Schitt's Creek and I really want to write fanfic for it but there's nobody to bounce conversation with because literally nobody is good at communication in this show and I can't actually smoosh a character's personality together like I do with most of my fandoms so I'm holding out hope for a new character who is good at listening.)

Someone’s playing a violin recording in the ceiling and Jason has money on the fact that it was Dick fucking Grayson.

“It’s not Dick,” Steph says, smug as shit despite the fact that Jason knows for a fucking fact that Dick is exactly the kind of a jerk to pull off this dumb move.

“It is,” Jason squints at the chandelier, “And I’m going to fucking prove it.”

“How? You’re not exactly the ceiling jumping type.”

“Watch me, blondie.”

“I’ll be sure to have an ambulance on standby.”

“I did not train for ages to have this kind of sass.”

“No? You sure?”

“Watch it.”

“Watch what? You fail? The violin playing isn’t Dick.”

“Big talk for someone who hasn’t named her side of the bet yet.”

“I’m waiting for you to call it off. It’s mercy.”

“Sure smells like cowardice.”

“Fine. You can look in my treasure chest.”

“The one that I can easily break into and look at any time I want?”

“The one that nobody looks into because if you look into it without my permission I will never willingly breathe in the same room as you again.”

“Wow. You have this conversation with Timmers, too?”

“Yeah, when we first started dating.”

“He try to break into it?”

“Ooh yeah. Caught him in time and gave him the silent treatment for half a semester.”

“Guts, blondie.”

“For what? I have friends other than you guys, you know.”

“For betting something like that when I’m clearly right and going to win.”

“Nuh-uh,” Steph bares her teeth in a wide grin, “You ready to be proved wrong?”

“Are _you_?”

“Don’t need to be ready,” Steph flips onto the ceiling beams and creeps to one of the attic entrances, “Dick didn’t hide a recording in the ceiling.”

“The attic still counts as the ceiling,” Jason mutters.

Steph shakes her head and pushes at the entrance before hopping up and onto the attic floor, “It wasn’t a recording,” she says, jerking her chin.

“What do you—“

It’s _Damian_.

Fuck. Now Jason has to give Steph his motorcycle.

The kid’s so concentrated he doesn’t even stop. Jason thinks he hears him murmur a quiet, terse _Brown_ but Damian doesn’t stop.

It’s strange, watching him play. Damian stands just as tall and straight as always, but there’s something to how he holds himself, to the dip of his chin and the tension in his arms, that seems relaxed and at ease. As though Damian’s a fish in water.

It’s eerie as fuck and Jason can’t find it in himself to regret the fact that he lost because this is actually pretty cool.

He doesn’t know how many songs the kid goes through, only that at some point Jason decides that keeping track is pointless, and Steph seems to fall asleep at some point except sometimes she’ll smile when Damian plays something that sounds particularly lovely.

Then Damian draws his bow across the strings, after what was both too short a moment and so timeless an eternity, and the spell is broken. It’s over. The world sinks back in melted technicolor and wood creaking.

“That was nice,” Jason admits honestly, for lack of anything else to say.

“It was technically imperfect,” Damian says, upper lip stiff and expression cool. Somehow Jason gets the idea that he approves, all the same.

“It was passionate,” Steph says, eyes still closed, arms splayed on the floor and legs dangling through the attic entrance.

“Tt,” Damian clicks his tongue against his teeth, “I told you not to bring anyone here, Brown.”

“You need people,” Steph answers simply.

“I need to be left alone.”

“Not anymore.”

Damian puts his violin away with the sort of care he only seems to extend to his swords, “Why Todd?”

“Had a bet.”

“Why set it up?”

“To get free cash?”

“Hold up, you aren’t selling my bike, are you?”

“Of course not, you twat. I’m going to hold it ransom and make you pay me to buy it. You won’t give in, expecting to last longer, but inevitably we will become snippy and annoying during patrol and it will grate on Bruce and he’ll buy it from me and try and pretend it’s because we’re loud on patrol but it’ll actually just be his own awkward way of showing love for you and you two will probably have relationship stuff to figure out but I’ll just be loaded.”

“Should I worry about how well thought out that was?”

“Probably,” Steph opens her eyes and turns to Damian, “Because he understands your brand of angry.”

“Understanding is unnecessary. Mother said it was a weakness.”

“Maybe. But it’s better for your emotional well being, especially in the long run, so—“ Steph waves a hand, “I thought Jason needed to hear it.”

“He could hear it from below.”

“No, not really,” Steph closes her eyes again, as though the conversation has lost her interest.

Damian clicks his tongue against his teeth again, a sharp sound that echoes in the room, and then he scowls at Jason, “Well?”

“Well, what?” Jason demands, “I’m not your therapist, kid.”

Damian rolls his eyes so far back that Jason imagines them falling into his skull, “Do not tell anyone else about this.”

“Why? You know that they probably already know, right?”

“They know _of_ this,” Damian picks up his violin and sets it onto a chestnut bookshelf resting below a small patch of glass ceiling, “But they haven’t heard it.”

“Heard what? You practicing?”

Damian sighs and shakes his head. He glowers at Brown, who opens her eyes at that exact moment and shoots him a grin that says she knows exactly what’s going on.

“Yeah, yeah,” Jason waves his hands, “I won’t do what Steph did.”

Damian nods once, tight, cool, and moves closer to Jason. Jason half-thinks the kid is going to strangle him. But all Damian does is drop down onto the ceiling beams, swift and silent, and scuttles away before flipping onto the second floor, just barely slipping past the railing.

“You shouldn’t have done that, you know,” Jason says, nudging Steph’s side with his foot.

“Because he didn’t want it?”

“Yeah. You gotta respect his decisions.”

Steph closes her eyes, “You needed to hear it.”

“No, I didn’t, blondie.”

“Every time I listen to Damian’s music, I have your face in my head.”

“That’s not my fault.”

“It’s not a bad thing, Jason. It just is.”

And he doesn’t understand. But something about the quiet way Steph says it, the way her words seem to float out like soap bubbles, he thinks she knows that. So he doesn’t ask for an explanation, and she doesn’t give one.

__

“You’re teaching him bad habits,” Tim nudges Dick as they watch Damian sketch out Titus in rough, brusque lines.

“Bad habits?” Dick murmurs. Damian doesn’t seem to notice the two of them, perched on the ceiling beams a few feet above his head, Dick’s legs dangling down and Tim squished in a corner between two beams with his phone in hand. “What bad habits?”

“He does the same thing you do when you’re angry. Goes and suppresses it.”

“I don’t suppress my anger.”

“You do. You just shove it down and try to pretend it doesn’t exist.”

“What’s wrong with that?”

“What’s wrong is that it _does_ exist. And it’s got to come out, eventually.”

Dick is silent, one leg swinging loosely over the edge of the beams. Tim thinks if he reaches out and grabs it, he could pluck it right off of Dick’s torso, that’s how loose it seems. Like it has a mind of its own.

“Dick?”

“Thinking,” Dick grins, wide and wry and not entirely honest. He reaches out and pokes Tim on the cheek, “I should talk to you guys more, huh?”

“That’s not the problem,” Tim says, “You talk to me more than anyone else I know. And that’s _including_ Kon. The problem is that no matter how good you are, no matter how often you talk, Damian is ten and you need to lead by example.”

“I’m trying my best,” Dick says quietly.

“I know. And that’s part of the whole problem. Damian isn’t stupid, you know. And don’t pull that face—I know you didn’t intend to make it seem like that or you didn’t think that. I know. The issue is that you never want us to see you be unhappy and that’s teaching _Damian_ not to let others see him unhappy.”

“Dami’s unhappy plenty of the time though.”

“Not really. When he’s really upset—when he’s incredibly angry or sad—he shuts himself off. He doesn’t smile like you do but he just—you know.”

Dick watches the sharp, careful jerk of Damian’s wrist and says softly, “Yeah. I get it.”

“I get that it’s kind of hypocritical of any of us to judge you,” Tim glances down at Damian, “But he spends the most time with you, so he learns the most from you.”

“I get it,” Dick closes his eyes, “Just—be more vulnerable with him, right? More open and honest when I’m unhappy?”

Tim watches as Dick draws a leg to his chin, resting his head on his knee, and nods once.

“Alright,” Dick smiles wanly, “I can do that. Thanks for the advice, Timbo—you always seem to have your head screwed on better than the rest of us.”

“Is that your way of calling me smarter than you?”

“Well, that’s a given,” Dick reaches out and ruffles Tim’s hair. He tilts his head to the side and adds, “You know, if you ever want to give me an alphabetized list of where I could be a better brother to you—“

“Don’t be a barbarian,” Tim huffs, “It’ll be divided into categories of emotional, mental, skill, and vigilante-ism. Then chronological order.”

“My bad,” Dick kisses Tim’s forehead, “Want some ice cream?”

“You’re supposed to be comforting Damian.”

“I can multitask.”

Tim shakes his head and grins, slow and wide, “Shaved ice from downtown and I’m in.”

“Shaved ice it is,” Dick agrees.

__

“Spar?” Cass asks Damian, flopping over the back of the sofa.

“No thank you,” Damian says, scribbling out his sketch and restarting.

“Company?”

“No, thank you,” Damian leans a bit closer to Cass.

_Lie_.

“I will stay,” Cass declares, and waves Babs over from her spot in the kitchen, “Babs, too.”

“That is unnecessary, Cassandra.”

“Company,” Cass repeats mulishly, “Maybe not the best.”

“Don’t sell yourself short, Cassandra,” Damian says stiffly.

“We’re the best,” Cass agrees, “But Dick may be better.”

“I don’t feel like talking right now.”

“Don’t feel like or worried about what you’ll say?”

“This is none of your business, Gordon.”

“Isn’t it?”

Damian growls.

“You trying to intimidate me with that? Does that ever actually work?”

Damian crosses his arms over his chest and leans back, “It does when I’m Robin.”

Cass turns her head away.

“It’s alright,” Babs covers her smile, “You can laugh.”

Cass pounds the table, shaking in silent laughter, “Criminals are so stupid,” she whispers.

“I am a deadly assassin.”

“You’re ten, short stack.”

“I have trained with the best of the best—“

“You’re _ten_.”

“I am deadly and terrifying—“

“Prove it,” Cass picks Damian up, “Spar.”

“I don’t—“

“You must learn to channel anger,” Cass smiles, “Not isolate yourself until it passes.”

“I don’t—I don’t do that.”

“I thought you were honest, shorty.”

“It’s not as though I’m the only one who does it.”

“Well, it’s stupid and everyone should stop.”

Damian scowls at Babs.

“Just laying out the facts.”

“When I am angry, I become irrational.”

“Who doesn’t?”

“Father.”

“Kid, your dad is _never_ rational.”

Damian scowls at Babs.

“Or he’s always just—too rational. And he forgets how to deal with emotions. You want to be like that? A stone cold rock?”

“My father is not ‘stone cold’, as you put it.”

“Oh yeah? You wanna bet?”

“I will not stoop down to such levels—“

“Doesn’t matter what Bruce is like,” Cass interrupts with an impatient flick of the wrist, “Only you. Spar?”

“I don’t want to spar.”

“Don’t want or think you shouldn’t?”

“They are the same. I am rational and—“

“If you want to do it,” Cass pops up and holds Damian’s hands in hers, “Do it.”

Damian stares at Cass’s hands and says quietly, “I don’t want to fight and have all you see be my past.”

“No past in fighting,” Cass promises, “Only the present.”

Damian nods, and stands, “Spar?”

Cass beams, “Spar.”

**Author's Note:**

> Is this the first time I've posted something that's not a oneshot in this fandom? If it's past 10:00pm and you have nothing you need to do (no work, fanfic is something that can be done tomorrow) please go to sleep or at least prepare to. Get some rest.


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